Escaping the Amish Community, Non-Toxic Skincare, Thyroid Health, and More with Lizzie Ens

I have 18 siblings. We didn't have, like, access in terms of going into non Amish homes and using electricity and anything like that. But we saw things. My 8th week graduation card says promoted to housework.

Today on Midlife Conversations. I've got a really fun guest and story for you. I've got my friend Lizzie Ends, who I met when I was speaking at our friend Justin's mastermind. And what initially caught my attention about Lizzie, well, first of all, she's amazing. Like, she's all the things that we've been talking about on this show. Like she's a board certified functional practitioner and she's on the natural side of things. So she gets a lot of the things we've been talking about with gut health and toxins and hormones. She understands a lot of that and we're very aligned. But what I was dying to interview her about is she was raised Amish in an Amish community. Yep. A real Amish community. Like the real thing. She escaped being Amish when she was a late teen. She didn't know anyone or anything in the outside world. And we're going to have a good conversation today because one, I want to pull her story because I've only heard little bits and pieces. I want to hear this story. I also want to dive into what is serving her well in life now because she's doing phenomenal with her health, her aging. She's helping a lot of people and a lot of the stems from how she grew up and what she learned growing up Amish and how she's applied this into our wacky world now. So how she's done that. I also want to talk to her about skin and toxins that get in from our skin and why she developed this incredible line, incredible line which I religiously use her balm and her lotion, her cream. So good. I'm obsessed with the rose one. You might be sold out after this podcast, Lizzie, because I love it. It's so good.

And then I want to talk about.

Thyroid with her because this is something that she's been diving in and specializing in. It's gotten my attention more lately. Thyroid numbers do change, and in menopause, they change as we age. This is an important topic. So we got a lot to discuss. So thank you so much for being here today, Lizzy.

Thank you, Natalie. I've been waiting for this for a long time, so I'm very, very excited. Just so you know, before I met you in San Diego, there's a lot of people online that you're like, oh, they're really cool people and I would like to meet them someday. But you were one of the only ones for me. Like, I followed you for a long time. And so when Justin told me that Natalie Chill is coming, I literally, like, stopped in my drive and I was like, what? He goes, yeah, I'm like, friends with her. And I was like, oh, my gosh. Like, so that made my day. So, yeah.

So I'm glad we've gotten. And not only have we gotten to know each other, she's been now in my world, like, she lives right near me. We both live near each other in Arizona, and we're in our little business babes group together. We named it Arizona Business babes because we're 12. Because I'm 12. That's why I named that. She was one of my first friends here, and she's a single mom. And anyway, she's got a lot going on. But let's talk Amish stuff, because this is so fascinating to me. So when I was growing up, I remember like being outside of Philadelphia and you would see Amish community and you like, you see people with their horses and their carriage, and I didn't understand it. So let's start with that. Like, tell us how you were raised. Did you even know you were in a different thing, different environment than the.

Rest of the world? Yes, absolutely. I knew that because one of the things about the Amish is they don't live in, like, compounds where, you know, sometimes people think and have this idea, if you don't really know anything about the Amish, they feel like they're closed off in some compound and you like literally can't see, see anything to the outside world. And that's not true. Like, I lived on an 80 acre farm with my family. I have 18 siblings. My parents have 19 kids. Yeah, 18. Yes. And all of your mom was basically.

Pregnant for like almost 20 years.

Like, that's.

That's wild.

Well, she did have three sets of twins, so.

Wow.

But that a little bit shorter. But all of our neighbors were not Amish. And so like, our buildings were like road front. We didn't have like, access in terms of going into not Amish homes and using electricity and anything like that. But we saw things. So it was.

What did you think as a kid seeing that? Like, because it was different than what you were doing and living.

What did I think? I was very, very intrigued by it. And just to paint a little bit of a picture, the Amish people that you saw in the Philadelphia area, completely different from where I come from. So those Amish are a different sect. Where I'm from, it's literally the strictest form of Amish community that you can grow up in.

Wow.

So we had no electricity. We had no running water. We had no indoor plumbing. The Amish that you saw, they most likely had indoor plumbing. They had showers. They had their bathrooms on the inside. We didn't. We had outhouses.

Like, what was an outhouse? Tell it. Like, describe this.

Like, what did you have to outhouse is like. Yeah, it's like think about a. A porta John.

Okay.

But it's a building, so it's like a small building. And they have, you know, the. The porta john holes and stuff. And we. When I was growing up, we didn't have toilet paper. We had to use newspaper.

What? Not even, like, water. You used newspaper?

Newspaper, yeah.

Oh, my gosh. That sounds really stinky.

Yeah.

And not amazing.

Yeah. But what I will tell you now is when I go home and see my mom now, like, you bring toilet paper? Like, the last time I was there, I, like, looked at. I looked inside their. Their house, and I was like, oh, that's actually pretty fancy compared to when I was growing up. Like, they had toilet paper. Everything was. They had like. Like air fresheners hanging in there. And I was like, dang. Yeah, that's why.

But I guess you didn't know any different. Like, you're growing up. You don't really understand that Newspaper. Wiping your. Your tush with newspaper is not an unusual thing.

Like, that's what you knew, it's just what you know. Yep, absolutely. But, yeah, so that's where I grew up.

And then. Okay, so I want to hear more, a little bit more about this. So you wore uniform, right? You had, like, the same uniform. And I've seen you post, like, on TikTok and things. You had to iron it a certain way. It was like a rigid uniform.

Yeah, it's a very rigid. Very rigid rules on how your dresses are made, what the colors are. And we use straight pins to dress, put our dresses on. And those pins have even had to go in as certain way. So you always had to have your elbows covered. So in the summer when it was hot to roll up your sleeve, you couldn't go take your sleeves up higher than your elbows. The dress had to go down all the way down to your angles. And then there was layers of clothing. Like, we made all of our own clothes. Like, we even made our underwear. We even made our period wear. Like, whatever we used for our periods, like, that was homemade stuff. And the men too, the men had very specific haircuts. And so the men were actually allowed to have the buttons with holes to put that on, but the women had to use pins.

Oh, wow. And then did you have to start dressing like this as a toddler or like, when did you start having to dress like that? And what did. What do babies dress and what a toddler's dress?

In babies and toddlers, you. They use buttons for all of their stuff except for babies. They have the cloth diapers. So they use the really large safety pins to pin the diapers on.

Like the old school ones that we go to for diapers.

Yeah.

And then what about like, how did you clean yourself? Was it a bath? Was it like, how would you wash your hair? How did you wash your body? Like, how are you doing that? I'm asking these basic questions, but I really want to know because I think some of us have take such for granted what we have and how we're growing up.

Oh, absolutely. We had a big stainless steel bathtub, and every Saturday night we had to heat up water in a big cast iron water kettle. Okay. Then we had to take that hot water, fill the bathtub with that, adding cold water, and take a bath in that stainless steel bathtub. And that was a once a week ritual on Saturday nights.

Was it like one thing of water and you all kind of took turns in that water thing or did you change it out?

No, like, the younger kids probably shared the water and then at the middle age ones, and then. And then sometimes as we got older, we would actually take a bath out of our bucket because we didn't want to go into the bathtub. So we bucket bath, shower. And that's, that's how we.

Once a week.

Once a week. Sometimes I didn't wash their hair more than every two weeks.

Oh, wow. And then. But your hair was covered in like a bonnet.

Always covered up. Yeah.

So is Amish a religion or do they just all follow a religion?

It is a religion.

Is it a Christian religion or is it something different?

It depends. So there are some that definitely are Christians now. Because I've had conversations and it's interesting. I actually have Amish clients that come from a different sect of the Amish. They're more modern and they find me on social. They're technically not supposed to be on.

Social, but yeah, I'm like, how do they have a cell phone and social.

Not where I'm from. There's never. There's probably never going to be anybody. So my sex is called a Swartzentruber Amish. And they are 1000% prohibited of having phones.

Wow.

The old order. In the new order, if they have a business, they can have a phone. So some of them make their way onto social. They find me, and they end up being my client. And that's really, really interesting to me because I'm always like, how did you find me? And they're like, on social. And I was like, I didn't know you were allowed to be on there. And they're like, we're not, so don't say anything. Wow.

So how was it? Like, so how was. Talk to me about school? Like, what was that like, going to school as an Amish? Was it like kind of like homeschool is now, or was there an actual school? Did you have a teacher?

Yeah, we had a one room schoolhouse. We had a teacher that was from the same community. And they do get, you know, state tested, so we did have to take tests. But we went first through eighth grade and that was it. So once we graduated eighth grade, my eighth week graduation card says, promoted to housework.

Promoted to housework. Whoa. Okay. Okay, so. And then I want to hear about the food and your. How did you. Did you have to. Were you doing all your own food? Did you shop outside of the Amish community? Is there money involved?

Yeah, there's definitely money involved. We made our own money. So we would milk cows to sell. Sell the milk to make money. We had three to 400 laying hands. We sold the eggs we sell outside.

Of the Amish community. So, like, other people would come in and get this. Okay, awesome. Got it.

Yeah. So we had. We had so many customers that would come to our house just to buy. We rarely had to go anywhere else to sell our stuff because so many customers just came to our place. And then we grew our. Our own. All our own vegetables. My dad had an orchard, so we had our own fruits. We raised our own animals for meat. And then there are some things that we would go to the store for. We would get flour and sugar and some other things at the store as well.

And how would you get to the store? Would you walk or take a horse buggy?

Because there was a horse.

Horse buggy. And what about bikes? Did you have bikes?

No. No. So the difference between the old order in the. In the Philadelphia, Lancaster, Pennsylvania area and the more modern area of Ohio is they're allowed to have bikes. They're allowed to take drivers in a car to go to the store. We Were not allowed to do that. The only time we were allowed to take a driver anywhere was if there was an emergency. And an emergency was like, you need to get to the hospital real quick or you need to go to the doctor. And our transportation from state to state was either a charter or a grey hump bus. That was pretty much it.

So that was for emergency. But, like, if someone was pregnant and had a baby, would they do it in the community? Is it like, more like a midwife situation or what happens?

Yeah. So an example would be my mom. My mom had. Has 19 kids, and she had a midwife for all of them, and she had the same doctor for all of them, and she gave birth to all of them at a birthing center, except for one set of twins. They went to the hospital. They never do ultrasounds, so they didn't. They would never know if there was twins or not. So I'm a twin. And when my twin and I were born, the doctor didn't know there was two.

Wow. So, like, surprise.

So I was born first. I just recently had this conversation with my mom. I was born first, and then a couple minutes later, the doctors. My mom was like, the doctor's eyes just got, like, big and white, and he's like, there's another one. And my mom was kind of like, yeah, I know.

That's hysterical. So how many people live in an Amish community? Like, how you said it, you shared, like, how many acres there were, how big it was. But, like, how many people would you guesstimate were in a community? And did everyone sort of all go to the same church in the same community? Like, did you know, the whole community.

Was very, very interesting. So even. Let's just talk about the Schwarzenegger Amish. Where I'm from, even within the Schwarzenegger Amish church, there's still different orders within that church. And so what I mean by that is there's different. There's a bishop that may rule over the church that I was a part of, but then there's another community down the street that there's a different bishop that rules over that church. So just to paint a picture of that is we're all works and true, were Amish, but yet the church I was a part of, the bishop's name was Mose. And the church over here, the bishop's name was Andy. And we. To paint a picture of communication there, we would not be allowed to date from one community to the next because we were different. And so there was a lot of things I didn't do together from. So we wouldn't go to this church over here and they wouldn't go to our church over here. So it's kind of like, if you think about it, in the modern world, there's first assembly, there's non denominational, there's all these different types. And it doesn't mean that you can't commune with each other. Okay. But there's these different, sort of like sex, you could say, within the modern world too. And that's how it is in Amish world.

What do Amish. I know there's different sects and different orders and different communities within. But what is the general like belief? Like, why don't they like modern world? What's their reason behind it? Is it religion based? Is it like community? Like what is their thought process?

Yeah. So the Amish are, are break off from the Anabaptists. So the Anabaptists broke off from the Roman Catholics and because they didn't want to be government with religion. And so the Anabaptists broke off of the Roman Catholics long, long time ago. And then the Mennonites, which is a different version of, of religion than the Amish. So the Mennonites broke off of the Anabaptist. There was a guy named Menno Simons and he started the Mennonites. And then there was a guy named Jacob Amon that broke off from the Mennonites and started the Amish. And this was back right before, right around the time that the steam engines came out, when things were starting to evolve and modern technology, quote, unquote, was starting to come around. And the Amish were like, no, that's evil. Like, we don't want anything to do with it. And they said, we're going to create our own community over here because this is what God would want. So they created that. What's really interesting is Jacob Amon, who started the Amish, after a while he realized that this is not what he had intended, it's not what he had thought. And he wanted to stop the whole thing. And the people that were already in it were like, no, we want to stay here. The Amish is the way he ended up leaving the Amish community. So the person that started it left.

That's wild.

But in that whole process, there was a lot of martyrs that happened that people were martyrs in the whole transition too.

So when you were growing up and you were like. Because as a kid we all fantasize about what we're going to be when we grow up, what we're going to do. You know, we all had like our thing we wanted to be. What was your fantasy? Was it like, I'm going to be a homemaker, I'm going to get married and be Amish and have kids? Or was it like, I want to escape to the outside world? Like, what was your. What do you remember thinking as a kid?

You know, it's really interesting that you asked me that because I've had people. I had that conversation with someone recently and I said I was never asked when I was growing up. What do you want to be when you grow up? Because it's expected that once you graduate school, you then eventually start dating, then you get married and you have kids. And what's interesting when I think back to that is in my teenage years, I thought about those things in terms of, do I even want that? Because I could never see it. Like, I visualized things and I thought to myself, I can't see myself getting married and having a bunch of kids. I just could never see it. But I also didn't know what I wanted to be and who I wanted to be. So I have a twin sister and her and I actually ran away when we were 17 and we were gone for two days and I thought, this is my way out. I'm finally out. And she ended up saying, I can't do this, we have to go back. So we ended up going back and it wasn't until two years later when I finally did leave.

Okay, I have a lot of questions about that journey. I'm going to ask you in a second. But one other thing I want to ask that's coming up for me is it's so interesting because you watch the chaos in our world right now and there's just so much chaos and so much going on and there's all this longing for people to want to go back to more simpler times. Like, I want to grow my own food. I want to be, you know, community. I don't want to rely on outside sources. And I'm wondering if you get kind of like a little giggle about that because that's literally how you grew up.

Oh, yeah, 100%. And here's the thing, Natalie. I grew up there and I know what it's like then. I have so much respect and I value what it taught me I value. I'm so grateful that I have the experience that I did growing up the way that I did. Because what I see in the modern world now is the fast paced modern world and people getting farther and farther away of being Able to be self sufficient and taking care selves.

Like, if there's an emergency, we're in a lot of trouble where you wouldn't be an Amish community.

And so people are craving, especially since COVID like, people are craving simplicity. People are craving to be able to be more self sufficient. But many people don't know how to, like, how do I do this? And I think that that is something that the Amish have, right? They know how to be self sufficient. They know how to take care of themselves. They know how to get things done. I always joke because I'm like, we just get things done. Like, there's no, like, oh, I'll do it tomorrow. Let me Netflix today. Like, there, there's. There is get it done. And there's a lot of things that they teach without even knowing that they're teaching this, which is discipline and showing up every single day in that consistency. They teach that we got up every, every morning at the same time. We went and milk the cows. Then we all came together and we had breakfast. Then we went about our day. And there was every single day except for Sunday. That is what we did.

Do you feel a sense of power that you have that training in a way? Like, you literally know how to do that if you needed to?

100%. Yeah. Yeah. When? Sometimes when I have friends around me. And like, for example, I had a friend at my house one time and she was like doing something with my hair and she's like, hey, do you have any gloves that I can just put my. My hands in gloves? And I was like, no, but I have a Ziploc bag. You can just put your hand in a Ziploc bag. And she looked at me and she goes, I would have never thought about.

Yeah, I wouldn't have either.

And because we are very, very resourceful. Yeah. I'm always like, oh, there's a way. We'll figure it out.

Because you didn't have Amazon. You don't just jump on Amazon, order what you need. You're like, what do we have here that reuse or find another method for. That's wild. Okay, so what was the conversation you had with your sister when you guys decided to leave at 17? How did you end up turning around and then what made you do it again?

Yeah, so I was the instigator there. I told her at 17, I was like, hey, I want to run away. And she was on board because we were really close at that point in time. And so we did. We were the first ones in our entire Family out of. Out of 19 kids to ever run away. And we left on a Sunday night, and we literally went to our neighbors because our neighbors had kids the same age as us, and then they took us into the city.

So the neighbors were not Amish or they were Amish.

They were not Amish. Okay. No, it was. It was a Catholic family that lived across the street.

They were willing to help you escape at age 17?

Yeah.

Wow. Wild. That would be helping now.

I know. Very risky. Very, very risky.

But I don't think that's legal somehow. But.

No. No, not really. No. If someone comes to me. If Amish kids come to me now and they're like, hey, I want to escape. Can you help me? I'm like, are you 18?

Yeah. Yeah.

I. I can't.

Yeah.

I just won't. But we ended up at one of our cousin's houses that he had left, like, a few years before, and we ended up there. And he went to work one day, and my. One of our brothers found out where we were saying, or he just assumed that's where we're staying, so he called the house. And this was back when home phones were still up there. And my sister, my twin, she picked up the phone in the kitchen, and I picked up the phone in the living room. I didn't say a word. But she start talking to my brother, and he tells her this whole sob story of, like, how bad it is on our mom because my dad died when I was. When we were 13, so it was just my mom with a whole bunch of kids at home.

Yeah.

And it's like they mourn you. Like someone died.

And did you leave a note or anything? You just gone?

No, I think. I believe we left a note. Yeah.

You're like, love you, but out of here.

I can't remember what we said at that point in time. I do remember what I said the second time.

Okay.

But. So at the end of that conversation, my. My s. Went, you have to come pick us up. I can't do this. And I, like, literally, like, my heart sank to my feet. I was like, what am I going to do? But I couldn't not go back.

Because you weren't going to leave your sister, too.

I wasn't. Yeah. And they were coming over there with a horse and bucky to pick us up. And it was, like, the most devastating thing in my life. The next day, I told her, I said, listen, I'm not staying. Like, I'm going to leave again. And she was like, yeah, I. I'm not Staying either. But we ended up the following year, we became members of the church, which means we joined the church. We got bapt heist. It's when we were expected to do it because it's the age we were at. And I was a member of the church for six months before I then finally left for real.

So what was the conversation with your mom when you guys came back the first time? Was she mad at you? Were you in trouble? Did she understand, like, what was the. That.

I mean, we were. We were definitely in trouble, but. But they didn't want to be mad at us. They were all like, really, really kind. And they kind of like, let us do whatever we wanted to do for a while because they didn't. They didn want us to be mad and then leave again. So they were extra nice to us. And that's kind of the transition because they want to, like, keep you there, so they weren't going to be mean.

So what was the next step? Like, how did you. You knew you were going to do it again? What made you decide and what did you tell people the second time and what made it stick the second time?

Yeah, so you can't tell anybody that you're leaving.

Okay?

Nobody. So by. So this was 17 when my twin and I did it the first time. By the time, two years later, at 19, when I finally did leave, I was a member of the church. I was dating this guy from New York. And we only.

Was he Amish, too?

He was Amish too, yeah. But we only saw each other like, twice a year. And then we. We, like, wrote letters to each other. And at this point in time, I was working at my oldest sister's house and she just had a baby and I was helping her out, and it was my turn to deliver a letter to my boyfriend. So I walk up to the mailbox to deliver this letter and I. When I open up the mailbox, there was a note in there, but it didn't have an address, but he had my name on it. I was like. And I knew it was his handwriting. And so I was confused because him and I had never talked about leaving ever. So the note said that he left the day before with his sister and her boyfriend. They drove down from New York and if I wanted to leave, they would come by that night at 10pm and pick me up. And Natalie, I'm not kidding. Like, I snapped my fingers and I said, I'm leaving.

Okay.

I didn't even think.

No. So what did you leave for your mom or what did you do what did you have?

So I had to wait until. That was at noon. And I had to wait until night time. And I was like, do I tell anybody? Like, who do we? And I knew I couldn't tell anybody. Absolutely not. Because there could be an intervention. They'll try to keep you from going. So I waited. And this wasn't at home. I wasn't at. I wasn't with my mom. I was with my sister and her family. So I waited until everybody was like going to bed that night. And I was the only one. One that was. Was sleeping on the third floor. So I go upstairs and as soon as I walk into my room, I like, rip the coppering off my hair. And I was like, I'm not taking this with me. I let my hair down. And then I write a note, and I write a note to my mom and I said to her, I have to go. And I said, this has nothing to do with anybody here. I'm not mad at anybody, but I have to go. And when I think about that note and I look back at that, I'm like, I can't even believe that I. I knew to say that. Like, I just.

Yeah, that was so. It's so the truth. It was literally the truth.

Yeah.

Otherwise people will wonder, like, what did we do? Or it was you. So you left. Were you scared? Were you excited?

Yeah, I mean, I. I ended up. I didn't just walk down to walk down the stairs. I had. I was so afraid that they would hear me walk down the stairs and go outside and not hear that I was coming back in. So I went over to the window and I crawl out onto the roof.

Wow.

And I ended up jumping off a 15 foot roof to.

Wow. So you go and you meet this boyfriend that you really barely know. You leave with him, and does it feel scary? Are you feeling free or what happens?

So there's a lot. There's so many emotions that happen at that point in time. Because really, you don't even know what you're doing. Plan is like, you just know you're leaving. Like, I knew I was leaving. I also knew that six months later, my twin was getting married. And I knew at that point in time that if I left, there was no way that I would be at her wedding. And I actually contemplating staying there for six more months so I could just.

So you could do that? Yeah.

But I knew that if I. I did that I would never have this chance again to leave. Wow. So I had to take that risk.

To make that decision.

Yeah. And make that decision. So after I left, like, I just remember, like, we got into. I got into the truck with all my friends there. We just, like, started screaming and yelling. We were all so happy, and I don't think I slept all night. Like, we were so happy, but we had no idea what we were going to do.

And where'd you go?

Went to a friend's house who had left, like, a couple years before. And crazy. Crazy enough I was the only one that he picked. But he asked this married couple that was from the same community that had left five years ago, five years before, and he called them, and he's like, hey, would you guys let Lizzie come live with you guys for a while until she, like, has her job and has driver's license and all that? And they said, yes. They said, you can come live with us for $50 a month, and we'll help you get all these things. Two days after I left, I had a job at a restaurant as a dishwasher, mind you. I had no Social Security number.

So how did you even get the job?

They pay me cash until I had the Social Security number.

Wow.

Did they help you get the job security number?

No, the couple that.

No, there was a. The. A friend of mine, his sister was working there, and so she just went and talked to the restaurant owners, and she's like, hey, I got a couple girls that ran away from the Amish community.

Wow.

Well, I knew how to wash dishes, so.

And milk cows, but there was not a job.

But the reality is, these people knew that people that come from the Amish community, they're hard workers. They knew that.

They had skills. Yeah.

Yeah.

So did you. So is this a common thing, that people that leave the Amish community will help others that are leaving the Amish community?

Yeah. Yeah. To help them, like, get started.

And you would do that same.

Like, you need that. Because if you've been so sheltered. If I wouldn't have had them, I have no idea what I would have done.

Yeah. Because you. You need some guidance and mentorship on, like, how you don't even. Like, a bathroom is new to you. Like, all of it's new.

Yeah. I'd never shaved in my entire life.

Wow.

So I had to, like, shave. Never had a haircut my entire life. So I had to go, wow. And then I had. I. I didn't have any clothes other than, like, the Amish cloth. I was.

How'd you get clothes?

I had a gal that, like, donated some clothes to me, but then I had another friend that loaned me, like 40 bucks to go to Walmart and wow, like one set of things. Like, I bought jeans, T shirt, some underwear, socks and shoes. That was it.

That's wild. Oh my gosh. This is such a cool. So did you. Were you missing your family? Were you, like, of course. Okay. And then. So how did you cope with that? Like, how did you fit into world? Like, what happened that first year? Like, how did you start adjusting? Because there was so much.

Yeah. Massive, massive culture shock. And really truthfully, you don't know what you don't know until you're out. You have no idea. And people have asked me before, like, how did you do it? I'm like, honestly, a naiveness. Like, I had a lot of optimism and naiveness of like, not knowing what you don't know. And I honestly think it's a good thing because you. There are some things that you definitely need to learn and know, but not knowing some of those things helped me because I wasn't scared. So when I left that second time, I knew I was never, ever going back. A lot of people when they leave, they kind of think like, hey, I'm going to be out for six months to a year and then experience the world and then I'll go back. That was not me. I was like. So I had to apply for my Social Security number, so I had to get. Go to the health department and get my birth certificate. And then I had to go to the doctor's office where I was born to get the only medical record that I had in my life. And then I had to get my 8th grade education card to go get my wow security number. And within two months of me leaving, I had my Social Security number, I had my driver's license, and I'm my first car and I moved out.

You were literally like. You were literally like coming from another country, but you were in our country, which is wild and starting over. Did you find people to be helpful or was it hard now? Or did you. Were people rude, dismissive, or did you.

Know, people were actually really helpful? I don't remember experiencing anything, anything rude in terms of, like, people thinking that you were dumb. I think that I for myself eventually, the more that I got integrated into the world, I always had the spirit of, like, I need to learn more, I want to learn more. Like, what do I need to be doing? And so I, after a few years of being out, I realized, like, I don't want to only be associated with people that come from the Amish. I want to be friends and align Myself with other people that didn't grow up the way that I did because I knew that they could teach me things that people from the former Amish community that are ex Amish, I knew they couldn't teach me that. So I started to separate myself just a little bit and I started to make friends with people that were not from the Amish community. It was very uncomfortable. Like, I cannot tell you how uncomfortable that is because I would be in conversations with people and I would just pretend I knew what they were talking about when I had no clue because I wanted to fit in so bad.

Yeah, that makes sense. It's interesting, you said something recently in our little group that we formed in Arizona. Like, you were like, I had. You said you had an awareness in the last year that like, wow, relationships don't have to be transactional. They could be. Or it doesn't have to be family. Like you can have just relationships because it's just a relationship. Like, you can have friends. You can. So that was an interesting thing to have said, you know, two decades later. So I feel like you're still getting like breakthroughs around that from how you were raised, because it sounds like you were pretty much raised like family's. Family, communities.

Community.

And then there's like the rest of the world's like transactional. It's almost like this. So you've had to navigate that, finding your own within that.

Yeah, well, yeah. And the big thing just to touch on that topic a little bit is like, I was under the impression if I wanted to have a certain. A relationship with certain people, I have to open up my pocketbook. That's the only way that I can show them my value and like, what I.

Right.

That I want to be in their life. And I was like. And I. My eyes got open because my mentor taught me that. He's like, Lizzie, like, yeah, you don't have to open your pocketbook to have a relationship with people.

That's right. That's amazing.

Yeah.

So you're. You've had two decades almost outside of this now. Like you've had and you've learned so much and come so far and you're thriving in so many ways. But what do you miss from Amish community? Like, what do you try to incorporate in from that now? What do you wish more people would use from what, how you grew up.

Community.

What do you mean by that?

So the reason that. So they have a really tight knit community now, despite all like the religious things that are, are many of the reasons why I left the, the rules and the control and the suppression of the woman's voice and stuff like that. Despite all of that, there are some things that they have absolutely correct. And the reason that there are people that leave and they can't handle it outside of the community is because of the family and the tight knit culture and community that you get and support. For example, when my dad passed away at 45, so he passed away unexpectedly. And they have a three day process before they have the funeral. In that three day process, they have viewings and the entire community comes together, cleans the homes, prepares food, gets everything ready for the funeral. The entire community does that.

Wow.

And I think that that is massively what is missing in the modern world. Like everything is so fast paced. It also depends on where in the country you live. Because if I go back to the Midwest at certain parts I'm like, wow, this is much slower pace than what I'm used to. Yeah, Arizona.

Yeah.

So, but that culture in that community. But when I visit, like my sister who also left the Amish community where she is in Ohio, they definitely, she, she got married to someone that also is from the Amish community, but a different order of the Amish community. And they have, they have instilled some of that, that communities in their lives now. And if you're still around it, you're going to do that. I just moving out to the west coast and being in a completely different world, I would say that is one of the biggest things that is missing community.

Interesting. What about. Because I know your focus is so much with health and nutrition. What and I, and I, I know you eat similar to how I eat. We focus on unprocessed natural foods. I'm assuming a lot of that has to do with how you grew up or is that because you chan transitioned to how most Americans eat? Like, I'm curious your journey there and what you've taken back from how you grew up to how you eat now.

I think it's a little bit of both. So I obviously grew up cooking my own food since I was like 8 years old. So I knew how to cook. That doesn't mean that everything was healthy. One of the misconceptions about the Amish community is even though they grow all their, they grow their own food and they make things from scratch and all that, if they were to take all of that and cook their food in a little bit healthier manner, hey, they would have it all in terms of their food. But they cook their food in a way that isn't Always necessarily healthy. So there's a lot of fried foods, there's a lot of sugars. I mean, we made pies every single week. Like we ate a lot of those things. So from a cooking aspect and cooking from scratch, 100%. I got that from growing up. But what I've done and transition into my, my business and my career and what I do now is I take those skills and I just turn them into a much healthier process and then teach people how to do that as well. And one of the things that I like to teach people is like, simple is better. The simpler you keep things, the better it is.

So when you. I just realized something. I just connected the dots on something you said that we, it wasn't necessarily the healthiest. We'd have pie, we'd have all these things. Sugar, extra. That's. I would imagine body image a different thing too, because of how you dress. Like, I think of a 17 year old girl now or 16 year old girl now trying to fit in. In TikTok world, like, body image is a really big thing. But in Amish community, you didn't have digital, you didn't have access to all that. Everyone's wearing the same uniform. Was it even a thing?

Yeah, it was. And this was. This is gonna blow your mind. So it definitely was. And it really, really depends. So when. Because it varies on the situation. So I have a twin. And when, when her and I were younger, I was always the bigger one. I was bigger when I was born and then I was just always bigger. She was pretty tiny. And because of that, I wasn't obese or anything like that, but because I was bigger than she was, I got bullied and, and I got bullied for my weight and called all kinds of things. And because of that I developed. In my teenage years, I developed an extremely unhealthy relationship with myself, my body and food. Like I, I would say I was. I had a massive eating disorder while I was still Amish.

Okay, this is wild because so many people blame that on technology and you didn't have technology. So it's a real thing. Community. It sounds like, yeah, 100. That's important because I really do think people blame, you know, YouTube, tick tock, whatever.

And I think that that can be a part of it. But it's like, are you looking for something to blame or are you looking at like what is really going on in.

Right. That's wild. Wow. And then. Okay, so comparison's still there. All of that's still real. What about skincare products and things like that. Because like I know right now with Ms. Commando, like you make your own products, your. Your business makes own sk.

There.

Was that something you learned Amish and how were they with those types of products and was having like exposure all these toxins, that's like a big real problem right now in modern world. Was that a problem there?

So unfortunately I, I wish I could say it wasn't, but we also weren't allowed a lot of things. So we didn't have makeup, we didn't have a lot of like skincare stuff. We, we had soaps. We, we had good old Duff and Irish Spring soap that we used and we had. Sometimes we have body lotion but very rare. We weren't even allowed to wear underarm deodorant a lot.

Really?

Yeah.

And you shower once a week, so it smelled really good over there.

But. But it was, it just wasn't something like. I actually had really bad hormonal acne when I was a teenager. Like really, really bad. And I was so incredibly embarrassed by like I literally I. You wouldn't know now, but I had scars on my face from, from it. I tried so many things and what I ended up doing is I would sneak like, I would sneak money to buy like those peroxide treatments at the store and I would like sneak by them because I was like, I have no other option. Like I don't know what else to do. And so that's an issue. But in terms of knowing like toxic ingredients, they don't necessarily know that. Yeah, but it's also not something that's prevalent in terms of, hey, let me apply, you know, 200 different things on my skin every single day. That's not really a thing either. I learned those things after the fact.

Got it. Okay. So your company, where you. Where did that idea come from to create those products?

Yeah, really, really crazy. A few years ago actually I knew that I was supposed to have a non toxic e commerce beauty brand. I just didn't know what it was going to look like. And then my business partner, so I'm the CEO and co founder of this company and my business partner now, he came to me last year and he's like, hey, we have this idea, we have the brand, we know what we want it to be. Because the other thing that sets up us apart is we are very driven on the environmental part as well in terms of what are our products in, what are the containers that we put ourselves in. Because I have been using non toxic products for a long time and One of the things that really bothers me is if I get a product that is non toxic or clean, but yet it's in a plastic container. Yeah, that's the whole thing is not clean. And so I. So he brought this whole idea to me and, and I was on board because I already knew I was supposed to do it. I just didn't know how I was going to do it. And so he came to me like late August last year and six weeks later we had the entire thing locked, launched.

Wow.

The whole idea here and the premise of Ms. Commando is one, there's a. I love telling this story about because people ask me why, why Ms. Commando, like what is the name and definition behind Ms. Commando? Is that there's three factors to it. Commando obviously means going commando. So like you're not wearing underwear and our products are going commando because we're not putting a bunch of fillers in them. Whatever we're scenting with, they're fatally free scents. We're not putting parabens in. They're all. We pride ourselves on like 10 ingredients or less in our products.

Wow.

Yeah.

Your soaps are amazing. And so are your. I have. I love them. I love all of them. It's amazing.

Yeah. And then the second part of commando means commanding back, taking back your health. So you're commanding back your health by caring about what you put on your skin. And then the third part is commanding back your environment. Like what are you, what are your products? Products coming in what. So good boxes and containers. And that's the whole premise of miscommunication.

Now, I know you talk a lot about different things like gut health and just healing with food and even weight loss. You really do a lot of things. But lately you've been talking a lot about thyroid. Did you have your own journey with thyroid or what was. How did that become something that you started focusing on?

Yeah. So when I was 9 months postpartum with my kiddo, I was honestly the smallest I'd ever been in my life. And yet I felt like absolute crap. I was full on breastfeeding. I had a lot of skin issues, but also had a lot of bloating, even though I was the smallest I'd ever been. And I didn't know how I was functioning. But I went to this naturopath and she finally like, she checked my thyroid and she called me in the next day and she's like, I don't know how you're standing here, but you are subclinical hypothyroidism. Like, my TSH was at 22.

Wow.

And she's like, we gotta get you on something right away. So I did, I went on that. And it was the first time that I started to learn because I was already, I was working as a trainer and I was a health coach, but I, I, I didn't really dive into that stuff. And that made me go into, okay, like, what is going on with the thyroid? How do I really help? Because, like, I eat healthy, I make sleep a priority, and I exercise. Like, what is wrong here? And so that helped me once I got on the medication to bring the numbers down really quickly, but there was still something missing. Nine months after that, I tested again for autoimmune and I, and my, yeah, Hashimoto's antibodies were pretty elevated.

Wow.

And I was like, oh, my gosh. Like, you know, like, when you get a diagnosis like that, you're like, what the heck? Like, how is this even happening? But I have, like, really high candida levels. I had all these things. So what that did, though, is I decided to go back to school and study functional health after that.

And so I think diagnosis came from a blessing. Yeah, I feel like the reason I know unprocessed food and is celiac from years ago because I think that help, it propels us into a blessing around that, like, you, you want to learn and figure it out. We become a detective. So when you deal with thyroid Hashimoto's, because that doesn't actually go away. Like, you have that. Are you on medication the rest of your life? Have you figured out alternatives like, or do you do a combination?

Yeah, so I've been, I was on medication for a while, and then eventually it just wasn't working for me to be on it. And so what I ended up doing is I, I was not on anything other than just like thyroid support supplements. And I really worked hard on my gut and also working and figuring out, like, what else is going on. So one of the things to know about the thyroid is there's a lot of emotional things that are connected to the thyroid because your thyroid is your voice. And I don't know if you know this, Natalie, but if someone has hypothyroidism and also Hashimoto's, that is your thyroid, you know, is your vocal cords. And one of the things that would happen to me before I knew I had hypothyroidism is at the end of the day, I would feel like I was losing my voice voice. And I didn't know why. And then I started to find out after the fact that this has something to do with the thyroid. Well, it wasn't until years later when I started doing a lot of, like, mental health and emotional healing and really diving into that stuff, I had a mentor, and he said, well, you know, your thyroid is directly connected to your voice, and if you come from a background of a suppression of your voice, that will affect your thyroid.

Wow.

And I was like, oh, my gosh, that makes so much sense. And so I was a perpetual people pleaser. Like, I even. I did that in my marriage. I did that with my friends. Like, I made sure that everybody else was happy and I pleased them. Yet, like, I was dying on the inside. And so what actually started to turn things around for me is when I started to not do that anymore, I started to, like, speak up and actually, like, use my voice. Now, with that being said, there are still underlying things in the body, like physical things, vitamin and mineral deficiencies that can throw your thyroid off. So if your liver is not happy and if you have hypothyroidism, there's a good chance that your cholesterol is affected. And so there's so many things to consider.

So, so many doctors push thyroid medications or say you have to take the thyroid hormone. I don't know enough about the differences of all of that. And.

But are you.

Are you of the mindset that people should try that first or that they should try a natural first? Like, what's your mindset around all that? And what's the difference between adding in the hormone or doing some of the medications?

It's. It's very individual. It really depends on where someone is at. For someone like me, for example, my. My TSH levels were at 22. I. I had to get on that medication at first to bring those numbers down really, really quickly because that's okay. So I'm not 100% like, oh, you can't do medication. And I'm also. But if someone comes to me, like most of my clients that come to me now, they are like, I want to do everything that I can without medication, if that's possible, however.

Possible.

Yeah. What I tell people is you can go on medication, but don't rely on the medication alone to fix the problem. Medication alone is not going to fix the overall problem because now it can help with your levels, but okay, it's not going to fix the underlying issue that is going on. So that's what functional labs will show you, is they will show you, hey, what kind of vitamins and minerals are you Deficient in what is your liver doing? What's your cholesterol doing? What do you need to do a parasite cleanse? Like, do you need to do any kind of detoxes and stuff like that? That is where you'll get much more benefit. And you're. If you want to or need to be on medication, it will make your medication work better for you because you're.

Doing all these other things first. Yeah, that makes total sense.

Now, I recently started using something called thyroid glandular, and a lot of people are having a lot of good results with that as well. And it just depends, like, it's. It's a good fit for some people. Again, you know, within the natural field. Like, some things work really well with some people and for others they're not. And that's the one thing that you have to understand in the wellness field is that you have to be able to shift with the person is there's not a one size fits all.

Now, you mentioned a lot of Amish people still come. They come to work, they find you somehow they want to work with you. Is it a specific thing that you find they're wanting to work with you or do they just feel because you can relate to them or what's the reason they're gravitating towards you?

Well, number one is relation. Like, they do feel like they can, they can relate with me, but also, also they have health issues. Now, what's really interesting to me, I had this conversation with someone recently and I said, you know, what's interesting to me is that I do see quite a bit of, of Amish or former Amish women. And I said, what I noticed with them is their issues that they're seeing, underlying issues that they're having. They tend to not be as deep.

Interesting.

Okay. And what I'm. What, what it could be, hey, they're not taking injections, they're not exposed to all the chemicals and the toxins. And so what I find that they tend to recover faster, they tend to see results faster, and their body tends to respond quicker because they're not sleep in a way.

Yeah. Like a cleaner sleep.

Yeah.

Wow. So fascinating. I love following your journey and seeing this. So Lizzie's on. She's got a huge Tick Tock and she's on Instagram too. What's your tick Tock handle and what's your Instagram handle for people?

Tick Tock is Lizzy H. Underscore Wellness and then Instagram is Lizzy and Underscore Wellness.

And she does very different things. On both. But she does do a lot of funny videos too, around being Amish, leaving the Amish community. They're hysterical. She makes me laugh all the time. She also has her cute little son in a lot of videos with her. She's super knowledgeable. She also shares amazing tips around thyroid and gut and just health and well being. And then her product line also is absolutely fabulous. So I highly suggest checking that out. Where do they go to look at your product line?

Misscommando.com misscommando.com and then lastly also, I have my book, Amish Renegade and you can find it on Amazon on Barnes and Nobles.

Amazing. And we will link all of that up. Thank you so much for being here today, Lizzy. Thank you.

This was amazing. Thank you.